Insects, 



6467 



Worthy old Topsell, notwithstanding the ec wild and fell" attack 

 recorded, proceeds to enumerate some of the uses of wasps, which, he 

 says, <£ is great and singular; for besides that they do serve for food 

 to those kind of hawks which are called kaistrels or fleingals, marti- 

 nets, swallows, owls, to brooks or badgers, and to the camelion : they 

 also do great pleasure and service to men in sundry ways, for they kill 

 the Phalangium, which is a kinde of venomous spider, that hath in all 

 his legs three knots or joynts, whose poyson is perilous and deadly, 

 and yet wasps do cure their wounds." Another and still more remark- 

 able use in the wasp follows ; it is, says our author, " very effectual 

 against a quartain ague, if you catch her with your left hand and tie 

 or fasten her to any part of your body (always provided that it must 

 be the first wasp that you lay hold of that year)." 



The remedies for the stinging of wasps are too numerous to be given 

 collectively, but a few samples may prove useful and entertaining, with, 

 in the first place, some of the effects produced by their stinging. " Of 

 the stinging of wasps there do proceed divers and sundry accidents, 

 passions and effects, as pain, disquieting, vexation, swelling, rednesse, 

 heat sweatings, disposition or will to vomit, loathing and abhorring 

 of all things, exceeding thirstinesse, and now and then fainting or 

 swounding. I will now set before your eyes and ears one late and 

 memorable example of the danger that is in wasps ; of one Allen's 

 wife, dwelling, not many years since, at Lowick, in Northamptonshire, 

 which poor woman resorting, after her usual manner in the heat of 

 summer, to Drayton, the Lord Mordan's house, being extreamly thirsty, 

 and, impatient of delay, finding by chance a black jack, or tankard, on 

 the table in the hall, she very inconsiderately and rashly set it up to her 

 mouth, never suspecting or looking what might be in it, and suddenly 

 a wasp, in her greedinesse, passed down with the drink, and stinging 

 her, there immediately came a great tumour in her throat with a red- 

 nesse, puffing and swelling the parts adjacent; so that her breath 

 being intercepted, the miserable wretch, whirling herself twice or 

 thrice round, fell down and dyed." 



Wasps have their enemies, but quaint old Topsell is the only author 

 who I remember that mentions the fox as one of them. "Raynard the 

 fox likewise, who is so full of his wiles and crafty shifting, lies in wait 

 to betray wasps, after this sort. The wily thief thrusteth his bushy tail 

 into the wasps' nest, there holding it so long till he perceive it to be 

 full of them, then drawing it slily forth, he beateth and smiteth his tail 

 full of wasps against the next stone or tree, never resting so long as 

 he seeth any of them alive; and thus playing his fox-like parts many 



